July Issue 2000
SC State Museum in Columbia, SC, Explores the Practical Art of the l800s
Today Audubon prints, Edgefield pottery and miniature portraits are art. But in the 1800s, before the advent of NatureScene, Tupperware and Kodak, they had very practical purposes. Through Nov. 26, in the exhibit Fine, Folk and Fancy: 19th Century Works from the Permanent Collection, the SC State Museum in Columiba, SC, looks at a time before technology made everyday objects inexpensive and easy to obtain.
"During the 20th century, people basically did art for art's sake," says Robin Waites, the museum's chief curator of art. "It's hard for us to understand that in the 19th century and earlier, people made art for patrons or for specific purposes. There was a lot of 'creativity' in it, but most of the work served some sort of function."
The museum will display prints by Alexander Wilson (1766-1813), a Scottish immigrant known as the "father of American ornithology," and John James Audubon (1785-1851), whose realistic - and beautiful - engravings set the standard for natural history illustration. Works like these were once how people learned about nature.
The museum has an excellent collection of Edgefield pottery, a gift from the Gignilliat family, Waites says. In an era before plastic dishes, tin cans and commercial dairies, the pots held everything from milk to meat to moonshine.
On display will be work from the 1820s from Pottersville, one of the earliest factories, as well as "beautiful work by Thomas Chandler, who is one of the best-known Edgefield potters," Waites says. The exhibit will show how the pots became more decorative, partly in response to competition from factories in the North.
In the days before photography made it easy to record images, portraits were a way of honoring public figures, such as John C. Calhoun, and remembering loved ones. Miniature portraits were intimate mementos, often worn as a locket or displayed in a bedroom. The museum will show full-size works by artists such as William Harrison Scarborough (1812-1871) and miniatures by Charles Fraser (1782-1860) and Edward Greene Malbone (1777-1807).
"Fine, Folk and Fancy" also will include quilts, furniture, daguerreotypes and images of important Civil War battles by artists such as Xanthus Smith (1839-1929) and Theodore R. Davis (1840-1894).
Not only will the exhibit enable visitors to see the work, it will help them understand how the different kinds of fine art and folk art fit in with each other, Waites says. Coming on the heels of 100 Years/100 Artists. Views of the 20th Century in South Carolina Art, "I felt it was important to show the visitors what was going on in the 19th century," she says. It is also a good opportunity to honor donors and to display work from the permanent collection. Like most museums, the State Museum only exhibits about five percent of its collection at any one time. Waites also hopes that some people might spot gaps in the collection and perhaps try to fill them.
For more information about the exhibit check
our SC Institutional Gallery listings or call 803/898-4921.
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